[I began this “talk” by quoting Moira Lovell, who told us, “You can break the rules when you know them.” I broke the rules by reading this out loud, as opposed to having memorised it, or presenting it. How many teachers told us not to read our orals/mondelings? It turns out, I can lecture and present… But, this I felt was a time for reading. Thanks Moira for giving weight to my decision so the audience didn’t think I was a charlatan.]

In Lasse Halstrom’s 1993 film, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, the opening sequence reveals a small, neglected midwestern American town, Endora. We’re shown Ramp Cafe, End-ora of the Line Drugs, Dairy Dreme, and Lamson’s Grocery, where the lead character, Gilbert, works.

Gilbert’s opening narration explains that the annual campervanners are doing the right thing, just passing through. He continues, “Endora is a town where nothing much ever happens, and nothing much ever will.” 

When I first watched the film, it resonated with me because that’s how I felt about Hilton, my home town. And for a lot of people it is just a place to pass through, or just drive past on the N3, or drive to, to drop kids off at boarding school. 

In the spirit of Gilbert Grape, I’ll walk you through my Endora. In 1983, my first home was the rondavel cottage at the Hilton Hotel. That’s where my dad worked. Further up the road, the Shell garage, the only petrol station in the village. In those days, Hilton was a village. Opposite the Shell, the Hilton Town Board Hall, where our folks went to pretend to look at our kak school art, while they drank beer and OBs at the annual Hilton Lions’ Fair. 

Hilton Pre-Primary is where I spent three magical years with crayons, finger paint, blunt-nosed scissors, and crusty Marmite sandwiches. Laddsworth is where I learned to love learning. 

The Fruit Basket, since demolished, is where we’d go after school… Or to the Spar, owned by the Footselars, for a Super Moo and chicken and mushroom pie. Often, we’d have to hang around in Hilton Drapers waiting for our mums to finish their “quick chats” and buy fabric to turn into matching primary coloured tracksuits. All the kids in Hilton were dressed in the same Butterick patterns… With either gumboots or Bata takkies from Kubela Stores. On Sundays, we’d head to the Hilton Tea room, clutching 50c coins to buy candy cigarettes and other guilty pleasures. The owners of the tearoom knew which parents had permitted us to buy the real Benson and Hedges Special Milds on their behalf.  

That was the colour of village life. Not quite Gilbert’s Endora, but still small. 

However, things were about to get bigger. Soon after Nelson Mandela was elected president, we started to hear whispers. The village grapevine, led by the Walkie Talkies (a group of early morning women walkers), had heard Hollywood was coming to town. 

Our village was summarily upgraded to a town. 

The proverbial “They” were remaking Cry the Beloved Country. Soon after, we heard They was actually South African filmmaker Darrell Roodt who was diving headfirst into the much-famed Madiba Magic by giving us the quintessential South African film. “And have you heard, big hitters James Earl Jones and Richard Harris are the leads?” Suddenly, Hilton Library’s copy of Alan Paton’s novel was flying off the shelves.  

These were the days when Cry the Beloved Country was a symbol of hope and reconciliation… Slightly precarious, sure, but we were heady with the allure of the new Rainbow Nation fragrance. This was well before social media – people hadn’t yet appropriated the book title in response to bad news about the state of the country… “Oh Good Lord! Cry the Beloved Country!” – the calling card of the disgruntled Facebook commenter in reaction to anything government-related. 

But, as with all things that happen in one’s childhood, it was over in a village moment. Hollywood came and went, and Hilton went back to being a village, the place where they filmed Cry the Beloved Country. That hotel became known as the place James Earl Jones stayed. That section of the Midlands… Where “They shot that scene from that movie… Oh, you know the one.”

Soon after the trains stopped running, and the abandoned train tracks became my teenage place for measured rebellion.  

We all have a favourite quote that we bring out whenever we can to sound smart. Mine, which I’m fast turning into a cliche, was introduced to me by Duncan Brown, in that building just over there, in a small classroom, during my honours English seminar on South African storytelling. 

“If this is your land, where are your stories?” 

In the same way that disgruntled Facebookers have appropriated Paton’s novel as a catchphrase, so too have I with J. Edward Chamberlain. 

If this is your land, where are your stories? The title of of his book on placemaking and connection.  

This quote is at the heart of my work and research, because the best way to change human behaviour is by changing the environment. Humans like to think we’re clever and not easily manipulated but just see what happens when a McDonalds rolls into town, or when bins get removed from parks, or when you walk into a library with a vuvuzela. 

My partner Jono and I focus on public space, because in this country social cohesion needs a bit of a nudge. And, developing equitable multipurpose public spaces, that become places, are how you start to see change.

So, how do you change public space?

Well, you just decide to do it.

Jono and I combine mural art, storytelling, and a lot of plants and fruit trees to activate places. We treat the land as ours, not Jono and mine, but the community’s and through investing in that we’ve shown the power of connection through belonging, representation, and inclusivity. Having free spaces is quite literally freedom. But it’s more than that, when people feel invisible its easy to forget them. Having access to public space means being seen, and being able to say this is my home too, I am here, I belong.  

Cry the Beloved Country is a story that, through its title, pages, and magnitude, tethers us to our local home, our national home, and our global home. 

Alan Paton wrote, “When people go away, even the ground cries out for them.”

Which, to be honest, doesn’t always ring true, as we’ve seen in recent news about 49 people who definitely use “Cry the Beloved Country” as a catchphrase to trash our country.  

But for those of us who are tethered, that’s the sum of Home. When we leave, the ground cries out for us. That’s our South Africa, in all its complexities.

I came back to Hilton five years ago, because I needed to be home. And, while I used to think that when Gilbert Grape says that “Describing Endora is like dancing to no music,” that was a bad thing, now I’m not so sure it is. For many of us, describing South Africa is like dancing to no music… It’s not easy, it’s difficult… But we do it because we love dancing and we love telling stories. As a continent of storytellers, stories are our heart. They’re how we say we are here. We claim this space. We are tethered. 

So, what can I tell you about the filming of Cry the Beloved Country? It turns out, not much, but I was invited here today because of a particular piece of writing. And because I’m a storyteller and a placemaker, I think I should stick to what I know. And because I’m not famous, most of you won’t have read this piece, but for those who have, you can use it as an opportunity to catch a snooze with zero judgement. 

Placeholders: In a Station of the Station

[originally published https://www.jackalandhide.co.za/2025/03/12/placeholders-in-a-station-of-the-station/]

My brother and I were furious and jealous when our fourteen-year-old cousin landed the prized role of an extra in Cry the Beloved Country. She was tall and mature for her age, and my older brother was the opposite– you could always spot him in the front row of every school photo, the designated spot for the short arses. Neither my brother nor I were even in the running for a look-in for a coveted extras spot, but that didn’t stop us from being disgruntled, and annoying our mother about how unfair it was. The whining was palpable. 

This is one of my most enduring memories of the Hilton Train Station – a backdrop for a movie, a place suspended in time, swarming with people wearing fancy hats and milling about. And, it also goes down as one of the most exciting times in Hilton’s history… We had celebrities in town and everyone was in a frenzy trying to catch a rare sighting of Richard Harris and James Earl Jones. That was another thing to be disgruntled and furious about. Why wasn’t our hotel (The Hilton Hotel) posh enough for them to stay at? Why were we the hotel for crew? More whining. To be fair, my mother led the charge on this particular bout of whining, as it’s no secret she’s long harboured a bit of a crush on James Earl Jones.   

I know there must be other memories of this central space from my childhood. If I really try, I can just about make out sitting next to my mother on a brown pleather bench seat. I’m not sure if some of the fabric has come away and was fraying or if that’s just the mystic chords of my memory editorialising. Torn and frayed pleather seats that snapped at bare legs were definitely in vogue for that era. In any event, my legs are stretched out in front of me, and there are a tiny pair of white patent leather shoes that I can just about make out. I’m on a train ride… I have no idea where the destination is, that bit has long faded. There’s another part of me that sees myself as part of a crocodile of Hilton Pre-Primary kids in primary coloured clothing snaking our way onto the train for an exciting excursion. Did this happen or is it something that seems plausible and has become a false memory akin to the “Mandela Effect”?  

And then suddenly, one day, the trains stopped. Bugweed crept in, weeds crept in, and sprawling creepers metastasised along the railway. That part of Hilton was gone, hidden… It became a place of “used to”. This used to be alive, now it’s abandoned until some intrepid teenagers or drifters rediscover it. Typically, it takes teenagers, drifters, or the homeless to re-occupy spaces that “used to” and breathe life into them again. These are the breaths that resuscitate the lungs of buildings and we see life through signs, symbols, marks, and abandoned artefacts (usually trash). But as they say, “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure…” More about that in a moment.  

A months ago, my partner Jono and I were discussing public space, and the conclusion was that we’re woefully ignorant about what’s on offer around us. The irony and shame are not lost on us. But that’s how we ended up at the Cedara Station. We decided we need to explore. 

As our car drove up the dirt road to Cedara Station, I thought about all the rumours I’ve heard about the space over the years. 

“Cedara Station is going to become an abattoir.” 

“They’re going to develop it.” 

“Cedara Station is going to become the destination for a train ride to and from Hilton, like in the old days.” 

We park up and I feel nothing. Usually my memory is a magic wand that can get stories out of anything. But nothing. In the words of Gandalf, “I have no memory of this place.” I can’t imagine what it used to look like, it is all completely new and I have no frame of reference to pollute my experience of how it used to be and how it is now.  

“Fuck this is cool…”

We walk through the long grass towards the station. This is the old platform, and using my experiential geography I imagine that tickets were sold just through there. I wonder how much they cost? If you walk into the station, there’s a big chunk of floor missing and you can see into the basement. It’s a swamp of ferns, chip packets, sweet wrappers, new and ancient drinking vessels, and other detritus. I notice the skeleton of a VHS tape and smile. I wonder what’s on it. Cry the Beloved Country? 

The handwriting on the wall shows that brave teenagers have walked across the beams to leave their marks. The Hilton Boyz are a gang of eight names. I’m not brave enough to walk along the beams, and I don’t think peer pressure from teenagers would convince me otherwise. Meanwhile, Jono has spotted a wall, and he begins setting up his cans the way he always does, meticulous, pausing every so often to glance at the wall, step back, step forward. It’s a musical-less dance.

I explore the space, this Khazad-dum of secrets. There are stories to piece together… The Hilton Boyz who want change and to be seen, the invisible boys of postapartheid South Africa. The rebellious spirits who’ve drawn penises on everything, Shocking, you may think, until you go into the myriad of museums and see that phallic symbols never go out of fashion. There’s an odd drawing, a Rorschach Test asking if you see boobs, balls, or a squirly stick figure. Underneath reads, 

Fuck

Sex

Is this advice or a list? 

I move on, hoping young teenagers get the message, “Fuck Sex, fuck it.” Sage advice. And then as if they’re listening Bathini, Bona, Batchi, and Bek… (the last name is smudged) caution me, 

“Book Before Boys Because Boys Bring Baby.” This is written in chalk, and as if in a secret teenage pact, the girls have written their names below. It’s official. A clubhouse rule.  

I’m proud of these girls, I wonder where they are now. In the library I hope. 

I vandalise their space by spraypainting my name, Dr Jackal, onto their walls. Adults were here. 

I now have a memory of this place. Memories of this place. People have left their marks, told their stories, shared their secrets, made promises. It’s easy to dismiss graffiti and to bemoan trash. I hate litter, I try to do my bit, but sometimes you just have to see it as a part of a story. The things they left behind. I’d rather it was in the bin, but sometimes a reframe protects the mind from futility. 

Jono finishes his piece. And we leave. But we’ve left our mark. We will linger here at this place that represents the past, a place that’s never coming back, a ghost of the way things used to be. The old South Africa. 

As we get into the car, I think of one of my favourite poems by Ezra Pound,

In a Station of the Metro

The apparition of these faces in the crowd:

Petals on a wet, black bough.

“Shall we walk along the track now?” Jono asks. 

This is what we did as Hilton’s teenagers, but we are not teenagers anymore. 

We have permission, the space is no longer hidden. 

Food is personal. 

Nothing proves this more than the the latest shitshow courtesy of the Department of Land Reform, Agriculture and Rural Development’s (DALRRD) Food Safety Authority (FSA). In a naming scandal that could rival the proposal to change Cape Town International Airport to Winnie Mandela Airport, the department is targeting the labelling of plant-based meat substitutes. Up until a few days ago they were actually threatening to seize these products using the product names “prescribed for processed meat products in terms of section 8 of the Agricultural Product Standards Act 119 of 1990…” 

There is definitely an agenda here. I’m certain that the issue isn’t that consumers can’t fathom the difference between pork and plant-based sausages. I’m also absolutely sure this isn’t about “safety,” despite the looming presence of the FSA. What it comes down to is naming, and naming issues are always a veritable hotbed of politics. In South Africa renaming and naming things is a bit of a national sport, and boy-oh-boy does it ruffle feathers.

The labelling of plant-based foods is opening a can of plant-based worms. Loose terms such as meatballs, nuggets, ribs, sausages, and even mince (according to some articles) have been flagged, and then there are the more descriptive terms like “chicken-style”. However, nothing is making okes want to moer each other more than disputes over South African specific words like “biltong” and “wors”. These foods are genetically hardwired into any “National Braai Day” stalwart, and no doubt the common or garden red-blooded South African khaki-wearer would rather make wors out of his trusty Jack Russell than braai a plant-only version.

Here’s the thing, food names can be lank complicated– sweetbreads, head cheese, Welsh rarebit/rabbit. In America there’s a famous Southern dish called “chicken fried steak”. Any guesses as to what you’re going to get? Clue, it’s not chicken. In the UK, if you ordered Glamorgan sausages you’d get menu envy if you expected porky treats. These sausages were originally meat based, but the recipe changed during WWII rationing.

Wartime Britain was a tough gig for foodies. Horrible recipes were invented by the Ministry of Food to keep the morale up, and despite their heinous “mock” recipes, no one took the ministry to task. Mock travesties included pork meatloaf masquerading as “mock duck”, and a devastating combo of margarine, milk powder, and sugar dressed up as “mock cream”. And what’s interesting is that while all this mock food might have made people mock charge, no one was bamboozled. No one. 

The world constantly evolves, and language adjusts.

Naming politics comes down to ownership and power. Who owns meaty terms, and who decides what constitutes steak, sausage, mince, milk, or butter?

I remember being horrified the first time I heard about cauliflower steak. But, I got over myself. Things can be more than one thing. If cauliflower wants to have multiple identities and troll us as pizza and bread, I say, “Bravo you cunning beast of a formerly neglected vegetable!” 

Things being more than one thing is great for choice. And, we’re helped to navigate choice because supermarkets are organised in specific ways. This is why we aren’t confused by the ingredients in Baby Oil, and why people aren’t spreading shea butter on their toast. Plant-based foods are found in a very specific section of a supermarket, far away from the butchery. What’s more, the boxes and packaging literally shout “Plant-based!” “Vegan!” “Hug the bunnies!”

My concern is if you battle to navigate a supermarket and are befuddled by “vegetarian”, “plant-based”, or “vegan”, then you’re going to be up shit creek in the chocolate aisle. Speckled eggs, creme eggs, Easter eggs, it’s a minefield. This is made more tricky because I defy anyone to locate eggs in a supermarket they’ve never visited before. I’m convinced there’s a conspiracy. Honestly, it’s not unimaginable to think that poultry eggs could be assigned to the chocolate aisle, especially since I’ve seen them next to the Handy Andy before.

The chocolate aisle is a rogue unit of shapeshifters. Chocolate pasta, chocolate prawns, chocolate cigars, chocolate nuggets, chocolate mushrooms, chocolate salami. It’s a helluva thing.

So don’t insult my intelligence by saying that plant-based labelling is about confusion and safety. The worst case scenario of being “hoodwinked” into buying a box of chicken-style nuggets, thinking they’re actual chicken, is a mistake you’ll make only once. And the consequence? Perhaps pissing off your carnivorous children? That’s literally the worst case scenario and to my knowledge no one has died from the disappointment of eating a chicken-style nugget.

What’s really going on?

Anthony Bourdain spoke a lot about the politics of food, and his food politics were simple, “You eat what you’re given”. This belief informed his views on vegetarians and vegans, he saw them as fussy eaters who must duck. I can let Bourdain’s dogmatic beliefs slide because he absolutely lived his food politics. He ate everything that was served up. I don’t consider myself a particularly fussy eater, but I will pick the onions out of potato salad, and I won’t eat armadillo, warthog anus, fermented shark, or maggot fried rice, no matter who is dishing it up. So I think the new rule should be that if you’re not prepared to eat maggot fried rice then sit in the corner and pipe down about what other people are eating.

There’s a culture of viewing vegetarians and vegans as a nuisance and fussy. From what I’ve seen on comment threads, these beliefs inform a lot of the discourse around this food labelling issue. In fact the attitude is that this food labelling wouldn’t be such an issue if the bunny huggers just stuck to the fruit and veg section and ate the rabbit food they love so much.

Plant-based eating is a lot more nuanced than that though. Veganism started gaining popularity in about 2010. Before this most of us were skeptical of meals that weren’t firmly centred around meat. This was a hummus-free world, a world where frozen veg was just as good as the real thing. Non-meat eaters were an anomaly, usually met with a scowl and a plate of chips. I remember sometime in the early 2000s being on kitchen duty at the Hilton Hotel and I drew the short straw and had to make the “only-option-vegetable-platter” for a vegetarian.

Let me tell you, he did not thank me for it. And to be honest, I don’t blame him. 

Most of us actively avoided vegetables, and most of us still suffer from PTSD because of how our mothers and grandmothers would boil the living shit out of veg. The narrative was “eat your vegetables, they’re good for you” and delicious wasn’t even on the table. It’s unsurprising then, that when people actually opted to eat only vegetables, we labelled them as weirdos from the wrong side of the Lentil Curtain.

People on the other side of the Lentil Curtain have the bad rap of being sanctimonious. Or, they are seen as militant and aggressive. You may remember those radicals who stirred up a culture war at UCT in 2015. That caper didn’t do a great job of shedding the “Veganism is for privileged whities” lark, and the issue became heavily politicised.

But, have you ever noticed that vegans and vegetarians can’t eat a meal without having to justify and argue their food politics? They’re bombarded by incessant terrible jokes– you know the one about chicken and salad being the same thing? Top that off with the disrespectful host who says things like, “They can just pick the feta out of the salad and eat that”.

It feels like a lot of this heckling is generational and it’s as if “oldies” are associating a plant-based diet with wokeness. Well, here’s food for thought, the World War II diet was predominantly plant-based, and it’s widely accepted that at this point in history, Britain had never been healthier.

The generation that followed these plant-based patriots, the “Boomers”, were fuelled by caffeine and cigarettes for the most part. This was also the generation that fed kids tartrazine and frozen food, so it’s a bit rich for them to say they’re experts on what constitutes enough calcium and protein. No judgement here, I’m hardly a paragon of virtue, but I cannot fathom how anyone could look at a plant-based bowl of delicious grains, legumes, and vegetables, and argue that there aren’t enough nutrients? Particularly because a bowl of Fruit Loops is credited with having “everything a growing child needs,” and no one bats an eyelid.

It’s not only generational, there’s also a pervasive gendered element to food. Did you know that it’s way more acceptable for women to be vegan/vegetarian?

Of course you did.

The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1984) boldly stated that men are “the natural meat eaters”. I have him to thank for the time I went to a wedding and was served the dry chicken breast while my partner got the delicious looking sirloin. 9.5 times out of 10 a waitron will assume the man is having the steak and chips and the woman is having the Caesar salad. There are also rules about what “real men” eat and the belief that real men like their meat advertising laden with sexual innuendos and scantily clad women.

A 2011 study by social psychologists showed that meat and masculinity are directly linked. Vegetarians are seen as less masculine and more sensitive, hence more feminine. Research also shows that men are embarrassed to eat vegetarian or vegan food in public.

What’s actually embarrassing is how much meat we’re eating and how bad this is for the environment. I’ve heard all of the counter arguments but the heaps of scientific studies don’t lie. The fact is that in fifty years meat and dairy production has gone up more than four times. Every guideline advises limiting our meat intake yet 84% of the country is going heavily above these recommendations.

For the skeptics among you who’re wondering where I’m “cherry-picking” my facts about the environmental impact of the meat industry from? Here’s the deal – The United Nations, and an Oxford University study published in the highly reputable and aptly named journal, Science. And if you’re worried about the fact that maybe these homies haven’t done their research, in the Oxford study the research covered 40 000 farms in 119 countries. One of their key findings was that plant-based meat is up to 10 times better for the planet than meat.

Should I drop the mic or are you still Googling that one study you like to copy and paste into social media comments from that random journal funded by Meat Eaters Monthly?

The South African government is on board with the research and they wholeheartedly agree that industrialisation and agriculture need reform. This is a small start to paving the way towards “reducetarian” diets. And, although less than 5% of the South African population is vegetarian, about 20% are trying to limit meat intake. Maybe this statistic is at the root of what’s threatening the psyche of the South African meat industry?

Food evolves and so do diets. And the limited view that only vegans and vegetarians eat plant-based products is absurd. Furthermore, the view that if you give up meat you shouldn’t want to eat anything resembling meat is a sign you haven’t engaged with the myriad of reasons why people limit meat or stop eating it altogether.  

Going back to the crux of this… What the meat industry, DALLRD, and the FSA want us to think this about, is naming and confusion. So to bury that logic once and for all, let’s go straight to linguistics. And to drive my point home, I think my favourite scene from The English Patient does this better than I can. Katherine (Kristin Scott-Thomas) is presented to Almásy (Ralph Fiennes) and she says, “Jeffrey gave me your monograph when I was reading up on the desert, very impressive.”

Almásy, a man of very few words says, “Thank you”.

Katherine continues, “I wanted to meet the man who could write such a long paper with so few adjectives.”

Almásy jumps in, “A thing is still a thing no matter what you place in front of it. Big car, slow car, chauffeur driven car…”

At this point Jeffrey, Katherine’s husband, interrupts. “Broken car?”

“Still a car,” says Almasy.

Katherine then chimes in, “Love. Romantic love, plutonic love, filial love… quite different things surely?”

And with that Almasy is stumped, “Now there you have me.” [End]

Things can be more than one thing.

Today these two gorgeous young whipper snappers came into the gallery and “found it really interesting”. For context when they first arrived it was like they’d just been listening to Eye of the Tiger on repeat for premium ampage. There was a lot of running around and I was dubious about the “30 minute immersive audio-visual experience pitched at the older crowd,” and how long it would be before their frazzled mom packed it up and called Time of Death on Culture. 

I got down to some editing, thinking, “any minute now”. 

The minute didn’t come.

I love being surprised. These kids were magical. Afterwards, we had a chat and it turns out they love art and are en route to buy canvases and art supplies from, let’s call it “Bonkers Bazaar of Plastic Shit”. Apparently, they’re going to “buy the whole shop”. It made me think back to my school holidays and that feeling of being able to hunker down with Judy Blume and a cold glass of Clifton (because it’s holidays).   

Kids just look happier when they’re not in school uniform. It’s a fact. Or maybe it’s just that they feed off my happiness and can’t be threatened by my resting bitch face? 

And it’s not that I didn’t love school. Laddsworth was the best. Things just started to get a bit ropey in high school. Which is kind of where this story comes from. It also comes from Hilton Chat. 

Yesterday a rad dad posted this absolute cracker… Photos of his two girls going science befok. Apparently, their holiday pursuit is fixing broken electronics. Judy Blume and heaped teaspoons of Clifton just don’t cut it anymore. Rad dad says they have a 50% success rate, which I find astonishing. I’ve had maintenance work done and it’s a helluva mixed bag of Bertie Botts… I mean, when my mum accidentally programmed her dishwasher into Lithuanian or Latvian or whatever it was, she basically had to install Duolingo to fix the problem. Honestly, learning a new language was more straightforward than dealing with the hoards of “Mr Fix-Its” who crossed the iron curtain into her kitchen.

So there I was, 38 years old, looking at Facebook and thinking, “Jeez Dorothy we are not in Kansas anymore;” I’m Toto in case you’re wondering. Here are these two young girls buzzing off their collective nerdery/genius, and I reckon they’re between 9 and 11 going on height. I understand height is a stupid measure of age because I’ve been the same height since I was 14. But, my poor measure of height is by no means the dumbest thing about me. I’m loaded with stupidity. I call left and right “up and down”, and I constantly dazzle Jono with my inability to name colours correctly. His blue jumper is actually green, or maybe it’s the other way round, and today I told him to take the red pills. They’re pink. You can imagine how my colour deficit annoys an artist? Not to mention the real danger he has of killing himself accidentally by taking red pills instead of pink ones.

Which leads me neatly to one of my favourite stories about how thick I can be for a nerd. It’s 1998 and I’m in Grade 9, or Std 7 as I call it because no amount of Judy Blume could make me adopt the American system. I’m in “General Science” and the word “project” gets thrown into the ether. At this stage of my life, I’m terrified of Science and my creative brain just thinks it’s all connected to magic, and there’s no explaining that shit no matter how assertive your Science teacher is. This was before I listened to podcasts on magic and learned how David Copperfield made the Statue of Liberty disappear. Anyway, I can’t remember what the assignment details were, but it involved a poster (yay!) and research (not so yay). Sadly my poster-making skills were not enough to save this absolute car crash of a shitshow.

The research question I carefully cooked up: Are Ants Colourblind?

I can still imagine my poor Science teacher’s face, as she looked at the calendar towards her now-early retirement vision. 

Here’s how my rigorous research went down, in case any of you would like to replicate this study at home. 

First, you will need sheets of coloured paper (number of sheets and colours not specified).

OK, so you know I was bossies for making posters? Well, I had shit loads of colourful paper. I had rainbow-coloured pads busting with pastels and neons and good old primary colours. It really is a fucking wonder I can’t tell pink from red, or green from blue. Oh yes, cream is a universal colour for anything from beige to light brown. 

You will also need sugar (I used granulated white, the amount left in the Huletts bag)

So get out your best colourful paper, and go straight to the kitchen to grab the sugar. 

Identify a popular ant zone. 

Then make your way to the pool area because this has a “high incidence of ant activity”. Sadly, my proficiency in English and adopting the “bullshit baffles brains approach,” was not enough to save me from this horror show of quantitative research. Armed with paper and sugar I began. 

Randomly place sheets of coloured paper all around the pool. 

Place an unmeasured amount of sugar on each piece of paper. 

Return to the lounge to watch Echo Point and wait for ants to gather. 

After a few hours of K-TV, it was time to record my results. A few pieces of paper were in the pool, and the red, or was it pink, paper had the most ants from what I could gather. Green also had a lot of ants, which makes sense because nature is green, and ants like nature. I didn’t count the ants because I was on an advert break and the results… well this was hardcore academic rigour. The results spoke for themselves.

Or did they?

Obviously I didn’t have Google in those days, but this will blow your mind… ‘Ants do not have color vision and are red-green blind (able to detect only yellow and blue). However, their ability to distinguish between contrast levels is greater than that of humans. They can also differentiate ultraviolet light which helps them find food.’ (misfitanimals.com)

If you’re looking for a Science tutor for your struggling child, my Science teacher described me as “original,” I’m that good. 

At Gallery ZAZA, it’s about more than just the art on the walls, it’s about what the walls say – whether it’s gallery walls, or public walls festooned with the imaginings of a street artist or young upstart. This is important, because we’re about to empty the gallery walls for our second exhibition. We’re starting afresh. Wiping the slate clean. And if I’m honest, it’s really difficult to say goodbye to what have become the best work colleagues I’ve ever had (sorry Ron Irwin).

On the mistiest of Hilton days, sodden and a bit miffed, opening the gallery doors to Hussein Salim’s aptly named “Sunny Day” and “Longing,” has been more powerful than my first mug of tea for the day (for those of you who have encountered me sans tea will understand). I’m so attached to “Longing” that I get genuine separation anxiety thinking about saying goodbye. And so I was eternally grateful when Hussein said we could keep this absolutely ravishing canvas in our foyer. Longing.

And then bit by bit, Siyabonga Sikosana’s canvases have started exiting the gallery for what some (not me) would call their “forever homes”. Paintings literally being hugged by their new owners beaming with smiles as if holding a new excitable puppy. I pause to imagine how much colour and joy these artefacts will bring. How they’ll pass between generations, echoing stories of their first home.

Sakhile Mhlongo’s two troublemakers have been “most excellent” colleagues. They’re so badass. These paintings are alive and stare at me every day, as if threatening me that I’m not working hard enough. They’re constant reminders of the beautiful juxtapositions in my life, and they always draw a crowd. I often catch myself looking at “the dude’s” jeans and then feel completely inadequate in my craft. They bring balance, and longing.

Then there’s the absolute joy and terror of being a temporary home to Logan Woolfson’s Rubik’s cube family. “Lucky Star” started to show his rebellious side, or maybe it’s just that he doesn’t dig Hilton weather and wants to adios back to Joburg STAT? In contrast, Logan’s other pieces have adjusted well to their temporary home. But Lucky Star just refused to comply from the get go. And then, one morning, the damp weather proved too much, and instead of opening the doors to an expectant Longing, I was greeted by the gallery floor, completely scattered with kamikaze Rubik’s cube shrapnel. Taking a leaf out of Tracey Emin’s book we improvised, and adopted “art installation,” and it’s amazing how many people haven’t even balked at this. “Lucky Star”, now affectionately known as “Unlucky Star” has become a metaphor for 2021… It really is how you frame it.

The gallery walls are ephemeral, ever changing, and we love that, because nothing lasts forever. It makes us want to live in the moment and to cherish what we have. To stop when we see something beautiful, and to soak it in. The other day Jono and I spent about half an hour watching a troop of monkeys use the parking lot carport netting as a trampoline. We witnessed a baby monkey steal a plastic bag from the alpha male and tease him with it. It was completely magic, and a reminder that there is so much beauty in the world. If you just stop. 

Which leads me to one of those juxtapositions I was banging on about earlier. If you have driven down Chief Albert Luthuli Road recently you would have seen the end of an era. Burczak’s Picture Framers has moved to their new and magnificent site in Victoria Road, and the old building is under construction. All of this seems like progress, except that the Basquiat mural has vanished.

It started with a red tag, blood was drawn. Then a few markings were made on the wall. Scars. Then a few pre-emptive holes were bashed in. Now I’m what some would call a “romantic pessimist”, so I went deep down the path of “no worries, nothing to see here, they’re going to work around it”.

‘Hi my name’s Jaqui, and I’m in denial.’

The thing is, I did actually know what was coming, I just refused to believe that I had to start adhering to all of my ideologies about public art… and ditch the hypocrisy. Street art is by its very nature, temporary. I know this.

But what if you really love it? I am, after all, the child who clapped her way through Peter Pan when Tinkerbell needed reviving, so I’m all on board for a bit of a “if you really believe” chumbawumba. And my internal dialogue was in overdrive thinking, ‘Absolutely some street art is ephemeral, unless you really love it, in which case you can save it by just believing that other people love it as much as you.’ Turns out this doesn’t work. Where the elegant Basquiat once was, is now a white wall and a couple of generic steel doors. Longing.

Ron English is a dude who theorises street art. He explains that street art is a cultural phenomenon, it’s not an art movement. This distinction is important because the very nature of phenomena is that they are beautifully transient, they are the fabric of our memories. They are what Abraham Lincoln would describe as, “the mystic chords of memory”. They form part of those spaces we look back on, they form part of the dialogue of, “remember when that used to be…” or, “there used to be something magical there.” We engage, and we remember, because they’re gone. They remind us not to take what we have for granted. They activate the “better angels of our nature”.

What a dazzling reminder of how to live and how to experience the world. And what a great way to engage, and to share our stories and lived histories. And I really should give you this banger of a Lincoln quote because it’s bloody lovely, ‘The mystic chords of memory will swell when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.’

Who decided Wayne wasn’t just some juvenile delinquent with a penchant for adrenaline seeking behaviour, but actually an artistic genius who pioneered a movement? What is, after all, art?

I’ve lost count of the occasions walking around a gallery, where some bombastic parent, with a muted pastel crew neck sweater, scoffs about the fact that his son or daughter could do loads better than the artist in question. This dude’s prodigal kid meanwhile, has a sticky lacquer and is busy groping every available artwork and yelling about an imminent snack emergency. Maybe this is performance art? Father and Child: Seen in a Gallery, 2018. 

The perennial question looms, ‘But is it art?’ And our response to this seems to all be in the title, or in the location, or perhaps, it’s all in the frame?

You may be familiar with My Bed. Not my literal bed obviously, this is a family show. My Bed is probably my favourite contemporary example of The Emperor’s New Clothes. And, this is a grandiose claim because for those of you who’ve heard me bleat on before, you’ll know that I am bossies for the Emperor’s clothing metaphor. But stay with me, this is a greatie. My Bed is a 1998 artwork by Tracey Emin, and it is just a dazzling display of how to reframe domestic ineptitude. Watch this space for My Sink, My Laundry Basket, and My Bedroom Chair. I have an overactive imagination and I’ll find a story out of absolutely nothing, but even my propensity to BS my way out of a hat was tested by Tracey’s siff bed. 

Yes, Tracey’s bed is grim. It’s reflective of depression, and a foray into alcohol abuse and using sex as a coping mechanism. Wikipedia nails it by saying, ‘When she looked at the vile, repulsive mess that had accumulated in her room, she suddenly realised what she had created.’ I think the key here is “created”. What a loophole. One woman’s mess, is Charles Saatchi’s next exhibition. And to those parents, and critics, poo-pooing this, Tracey defends herself as a lank trailblazer at the apex of creative genius. Sure your teenager can have a filthy unmade bed, but their failure to exhibit it in a prestigious white-walled gallery is where Tracey’s got the edge. Emin points out, ‘No one had ever done that before.’

That sure is dope Tracey, but is it art?

Is the crux of the matter that art is just about blazing new trails and being the first person to push boundaries a step further than anyone else? Is it by testing the very geography of art? Michael Ondaatje poignantly said, ‘Do you understand the sadness of geography?’ The very fact that geography stifles us is because it draws lines, defines boundaries, and declares borders.

So is something art because of its geography – where it’s placed?

As we understand it, art happens in a space. If tradition is anything to go by, these spaces are white walls owned by white faces. Traditionally, art is art, because it happens in a vacuum. But what does this do to storytelling and expression? Mapping, boundaries, ownership, geography, are prescriptive, and that’s not to say we don’t need structure, of course we do. However, we need to be able to reframe, to break rules, to make a mess. As my legendary English teacher Moira Lovell told me, ‘You can break the rules when you know them.’ 

Is rule breaking the essence then? Is it in understanding the distinction between a morose teen scratching their initials into a desk, using a permanent marker to write E+K 4Eva on a bathroom door, spraying YOLO over an existing piece of street art, or actually understanding how rules can be broken to create order?  

Creating order out of chaos is no mean feat. It’s an exercise in “iconoclashism”. Tension occurs when we observe clashes between cultures, where we change the visual landscape of public space, when we create, react, and respond. In short, it’s when humans move from passivity to interactivity. And it’s in asking questions about whose public space we are cultivating.

The normative happy medium is the reason we have Christmas cracker jokes, beige colour palettes, and elevator music. These “inoffensive” public systems are developed because they’re neutral and therefore no one can take umbrage to them. But what happens if you’re not neutral and are highly offended by panpipes playing Strangers in the Night, or working in a municipal building with yellowing beige walls? Is public life supposed to be moving from one space to the next in a state of catatonic bland liminality. Should we not be engaged in public space?

The theorist Clements highlights the fact that we need to engage with communication and space. We need to look at context and discourse. He observes that a shift happens when art is ‘displayed in public as opposed to hermetically sealed white cube gallery spaces’. When this happens we can change the frame and art can ‘become the central focus for a range of competing discourses.’ Applying this argument, we become better citizens of the world when we are faced with questions, when we encounter struggle, and when we observe clashes. 

The latest clash in Hilton is not just manifesting on election posters (yuck), but it’s being whispered in passing. To be honest I’m surprised Hilton Chat isn’t going gangbusters about it, but I think electricity is occupying most of the bandwidth. Here’s the thing, someone has “vandalised” the community Rainbow Bridge. A woman literally came into the gallery and announced that everyone needs to be angry about this. It’s “unacceptable”. It’s “diabolical”. It’s “not right”.

Jono and I immediately drove to the tunnel to look for the offending graffiti, and I won’t lie I was hoping for more. I was hoping for a rich combustive expletive. Instead I got “YOLO”.

Although well done, is there a more offensively beige phrase than YOLO? Are the millennials trolling us?

Sure, there was a time when YOLO was cool, and for a moment it was akin to saying cowabunga in the early nineties. But, like cowabunga, it was a fart in the wind. Maybe, in a few decades YOLO will be like high waisted jeans and make a comeback?

Ideas and trends spread through innovators and cavalier mavericks who take hold of something and share it with the world. Then early adopters weigh in, paving the way for the masses to climb on board. The masses are what make something go from alternative or counter-culture, to mainstream, and they’re the reason we have fashion and trends. Finally, the trend drops off when the laggards come on board. They’re the very late adopters, usually old folk, and they’re the death knell to something being cool. Close your eyes and remember the first time your mum said YOLO. It was probably the last time you said it. 

So, there Jono and I were, looking at the word YOLO painted over the rainbow. My knee-jerk reaction as a writer was to be offended by YOLO. I wanted better. I wanted poetry in motion. I thought to myself, ‘If people are going to lose their shit over this, it needs to be worth losing their shit over’. Of all the words to choose, they chose “YOLO”.

Jono, however, smirked in a satisfied way, and said, ‘I like how they’ve gone over as many colours of the rainbow as they can which will make it harder for people to fix.’ The artist in him was looking at the big picture. He was changing the frame.

Street art is not hermetically sealed. It’s communal. It’s a changing landscape and a changing story. We can feel nostalgic for what came before it, and we can be sad when things feel like they’ve been ruined. But reframe. Ondaatje explains, ‘We are communal histories, communal books. We are not owned or monogamous in our taste or experience.’ And I for one am bloody grateful for that, because panpipes suck, and apparently you only live once. And everything changes, even art. 

By now you’ll know that there are no prizes for sitting in the corner, and if anyone loves a public platform it’s me. I don’t just volunteer to do speeches, I actively push myself into the programme. So it was a no brainer, I was going to haul ass to the microphone come hell or high water. And boy did we have both. Saturday was the Grand Opening of Gallery ZAZA, and I kind of knew what was on the cards for the weather (in some circles they call me Jaqstradamus). 

I was the child who never got to have a pool party because every single birthday of mine was an absolute fucking rotter of a day. Fortunately, I was the type of child who was more into the food table, and less into the swimming pool, but it would have been nice to have the option.

Typically, Saturday morning rolled in a bit wet, and as each hour towards 10am approached it got steadily more like the “vicious cycle” on the washing machine.

At some point you resign yourself to these things and just open a beer. The breakfast beer helped to settle the nerves and things started to look up. However, Murphy was having a whale of a time, and so, as if by magic, things started to snowball spectacularly. The only thing keeping my sense of perspective intact was the wedding we had at the Hilton Hotel where the marquee literally blew away, tables ended up in the pool, and a tree split the best man’s car in half. The bride and groom ended up having their wedding in the Mist & Drizzle pub because every other venue was occupied. Turns out it was the best wedding ever.

I’d like to maintain the illusion that everything went according to plan on Saturday, but when the hail started and the generator flooded my adrenaline decided it was going to go into hyperdrive. Jono suggested cancelling speeches altogether, and for a few seconds I agreed. Then I reassessed, and decided I was completely keen to get up there and do my shit. Sadly there are times when the body and the mind have what some would call an “unconscious uncoupling” and others would call a cataclysmic divorce. My brain, it turns out, has still not grasped that “mind over matter” thing. Cue Uncontrollable Shaking from stage right. Of course the more I tried to control it, the worse it got. It’ll be chalked up as one of those performances that I’d sooner forget, but I guess I can reframe it and say it was special because it was so shit.

Anyway, here’s what I said. (For authenticity, if you read it out loud I suggest sitting on your washing machine and setting it to take off mode.) 

I remember when David Copperfield made the Statue of Liberty disappear, it was pretty dope. My question was, what’s next David? Get better David, do more! 

Magic in this context is about instant gratification and constantly seeking to amaze an increasingly unfocused and overstimulated audience. 

Perhaps it’s time to reframe. To slow down. To bask. 

As a child, magic was the recesses of imagination, it was the slow and lingering anticipation of the Easter Bunny, Father Christmas, and the Tooth Mouse. It was waking up on Christmas morning to the crumbs of a mince pie, an empty glass of brandy, and a nibbled carrot. It was that first pair of ballet shoes, putting Dubbin on a first soccer ball, watching a movie on the big screen for the very first time. Smelling the birthday cake fresh from the oven. 

For me, magic is about finding stories in strange places, but it’s also the ability to create them out of banal familiarity. Magic is painting pictures from nothing, from procuring sounds and smells from a string of small words, it’s the art of making a world out of nothing. Magic takes effort. 

Magic is home. Magic is place. Magic is community. It’s quite literally the stories we share. 

So allow me to share a story. 

My very first home was the cottage at the Hilton Hotel, further up the road from there is the Shell garage which was the only petrol station in the village. In those days Hilton was a village. Opposite the Shell, the Hilton Town Board Hall. This is where I’d spend Tuesday and Thursdays at Ros Nicholson’s School of Ballet. Here I proved my inability to live up to the expectation of Jaqualina Ballerina. The Town Board Hall was also where our folks went to pretend to look at our kak art, while they drank beer at the annual Hilton Lion’s Fair. Where every skottel braai in Hilton met once a year to play host to lashings of frying onions and sweaty wors. Carry on over the bridge, now festooned with flowers… If you were to sneak under that bridge you might happen upon me, in my later years doing rebellious things. If you take a right, you get to Laddsworth, a place that forged me into who I am. A school filled with the Sally Kellys, Pete Liddles, and Flick Wrights of the world. Humans who inspired magic from within the linear face brick architecture. 

Not far from Laddsworth is Hilton PrePrimary, the biggest most magnificent place on earth. Sandpits the size of Olympic swimming pools, a race track like Monza, a woodworking table fit for Santa’s elves, jungle gyms, and a crown for when it’s your birthday.

After school, if we were lucky, we went straight to the Fruit Basket, since demolished, or the Spar owned by the Footselars (I’ve used bad phonetics here) for a Super Moo. Sometimes Dave Hansmeyer would give us biltong. Often we’d have to hang around in Hilton Drapers waiting for our mums to have hour long “quick chats” and buy fabric to turn into matching tracksuits. All the kids in Hilton were dressed the same. Primary coloured tracksuits, gumboots, or Bata takkies from the Aladdin’s cave that is Kubela Stores. On Sundays we’d head to the Hilton Tea room clutching R1 coins to buy our candy cigarettes and other contraband sugar laden guilty pleasures. Terry the Greek would know which kids’ parents gave permission to buy the Benson and Hedges Special Milds for the dad in the car rushing to get to Opstal to blast clay pigeons out of the sky.

We had to make our own fun. Kid friendly bars and restaurants were basically those that allowed parents to push two bar stools together for small bodies to nap on. Communal parenting was everything. Wherever you were at 4pm is where you bathed. BMXs zooted down every road, pizza came out of a freezer and into an oven. We ate polony sandwiches by the dozen. Juice was red, green, or orange. It was an adventure to open the post box at the Post Office and see if there was anything exciting. Tupperware parties and book clubs were touted as these mysterious and magical events for our slippered feet to peek in on. 

Hiltonians have a history of seeing potential, as if looking through the mist and imagining what lies beyond it. And it’s up to us to create, to build, to explore, to play, and to throw glitter, confetti, and magic markers at every single problem.

Gallery ZAZA was an empty blank corporate office. It was the ultimate blank canvas. Now it’s the product of the passion and vision that only Jono Hornby could have cooked up. Even the starlings are dazzled. It’s home, and now things are appearing, not disappearing, as if by utter magic. It’s up to us, we can appear, or we can disappear. 

Special thanks to the amazing Hilton community for the awesome turn out, we had the best day sharing the space with you, and making it a place. There’s so much more to come, and I’m super jazzed!

On this occasion, it was 3 am, I was in Room 36 at the Hilton Hotel, and my brother Nicholas thought it would be bloody hilarious to wake me up from my slumber to enjoy a few seconds of euphoria, before realising it was March, and the Royal Show was a few months away. What an asshole. He really is brilliant. 

Fast forward to July 2021, and I found myself waking up to go to the Royal Show. And yes, I did have a tremendous sense of euphoria. This was despite the news that the showgrounds have been sold, and the days of the Royal Agricultural Show are another vestige of the past. 

Vestiges of the past. Remember going to Mike’s Kitchen and trying to get as many lollipops from the barrel by the door? Remember the fish tank at Da Vinci’s? Remember going to Capital Towers to watch a movie? Remember soft serve from Icy Cool Piping Hot? Remember being underage and trying to get into Buzz Bar? Remember Shuter and Shooter and getting lost in the sea of shelves? Remember going to Super Bodies to watch your mum do aerobics and being blinded by the men in unitards and leg warmers? Remember having a K-TV sticker on your space case and buying a snap bangle from the Lion’s Fair? But most of all, remember the Royal Show. 

I still remember going on the “baby rides” and anxiously looking for my mummy amidst the crowd of parents. Fast forward a few years, and I’m on the carousel, and my dad is standing on the platform next to the pink horse that I’m riding. He’s there in case I get scared, which is almost inevitable because if my Pre Primary report cards are anything to go by, I have the coordination and balance of an inebriated baby giraffe. On ice skates. Later that day, we’ll stand in the queue so my brother and I can get temporary passes to go into the members’ stand so we can watch horses do things I don’t really understand. The name Gonda Beatrix echoing through the loudspeakers. In those days, there was candy floss, those shakey balloons, and toffee apples that I still don’t see the point of. Siff. 

Then it was off to the army display, which was the same every year, but we still went because that’s just “what you do.” A visit to the rabbit hall, which incidentally I got banned from because one year my best friend David had the temerity to ask a woman with a very large “friend of the bunnies” rosette, whether they supply the Boston Barbeque. Sheep shearing, cows on parade, dodging animal crap, lots of hay. The smell of animals with a whiff of doughnut. Lining up to go through the “this is the rainfall cycle” just so that you could get a free Clover yoghurt. And speaking of free food, trawling through the food hall for free samples. Pretending you’re a connoisseur of preserves, with R25 to spend on a jar of posh jam, just so that you can carry on scoffing. Giggling as you walk away thinking you’d hoodwinked the cross jam lady with an ‘I’ll come back later and buy a jar.’ 

And then the second-best bit of the show. The much-underrated hall with all the weird shit made by grannies, bored homemakers, a few house husbands, and kids. I once entered a rock animal, and I’m proud to say that I got a “Commended” award. The judges’ comments applauded my imagination, but were stern in the amount of glue I’d used. ‘Take care not to use too much glue,’ they said. That’s right kids, stay off drugs. Obviously the kid who won had an overzealous mother, or maybe was just blessed with better artistic genes than me? Perhaps this child with the ravishing Highly Commended Rosette was given proper modeling glue instead of a bloody glue gun? Who knows. Safe to say I didn’t enter an artwork again; the judges clearly don’t know genius when they see it. 

In the early days, the arts and crafts hall was the main hall. You entered, and it was just chockablock with shit that would give Marie Kondo a cardiac infarction. I don’t know who makes and collects porcelain dolls, but can I just be clear? Porcelain dolls are more terrifying than clowns. They’re also porcelain, so you can’t play with them. Stop being weird and just buy your kids a Barbie. After the terrifying children of the corn exhibit, it was onto the cake decorators. The same woman won every single year, and I don’t know why other budding cake artists even bothered. 

But the best was looking at the scones. I’ve had a fascination with scones for a very long time, and I really think that if you need two women to judge a scone-off, you could do worse than me and my Emotional Support Animal’s mum Hester Joseph. Hester Joseph is a sconnoisseur, and if you try to deviate and make scones in a muffin tin, or make them square, you won’t get any support from us. There are firm rules about scones, and I’ve done a lot of research into where you can get good scones. You can’t. Bake them yourself; it’s the only way. If you want disappointment go out and order one, they usually crumble into dust, are served with marge, don’t have nearly enough cream, and come with that weird grated cheese that is all melted together in a mess. Have some respect. 

My young self used to spend hours lingering over the glass display cases scrutinizing the scones. Before I’d read the judges’ comments, I could tell that Sheila had overdone done it on the baking powder or Neville had overworked the dough. I could tell Doris had gone rogue and used margarine instead of butter, and that Maureen had nailed it. I didn’t even need to shift my eyes left to the purple ribbon claiming Maureen Queen of Scones for the third year running. 

No matter what age you were, the Looping Star was the major showpiece. Sure the Enterprise, the Breakdancer, The Ship of Death, The Wall of “What The Fuck We’re All Going To Die,” The Swings of “Don’t look up at the rusty latches,” and the House of “Horrors” were all worth a go. But in the end, it was the devastating and sheer Russian Roulette of the Looping Star that made all of us queue up in delighted terror. I maintain that it is the most dangerous roller coaster in the known universe, and it was out of order for most of the show, so it really was a race to get on it. One year people were left dangling upside down from the loopy part, and not even that stopped hyperactive kids from gamboling up the metal stairs once the out-of-order sign was removed for the umpteenth time.

Where were our parents, you might ask? Well, as we learned later on in life, they were off getting pissed at the Foaming Tankard. As we grew up, our priorities changed. Sure we still went on the Looping Star, but not before we tried to sneak in a few Hunter’s Gold, Solanti’s Spices, or good old Black Labels from the well-protected beer tent. Some of us had connections, others relied on older siblings, and some used their powers of persuasion to get any kind of illegal booze past the gates. The trouble is nine times out of ten, someone’s mum or dad recognised you, and then the game was up. ‘Terry, I saw Jaqui and her mates trying to get into the Foaming Tankard.’ Shit. 

And then it was the era of “the big field” where we’d all congregate with a bottle of Mokador and a few Peter Stuyvesant Blues we’d knicked off some suspecting parent. Dressed in our washed-out grey outfits and Dr. Martens, we’d mosh to The Narrow, sing along to Just Jinger, Wonderboom, Sugardrive, and the Springbok Nude Girls, and lose our shit to Fokofpolisiekar. Later we traded our washed-out grey outfits for Coco Bay; some of us held onto our DMs, others opted for Turtles. We were always late for whatever parent drew the short straw and had to drag our teenage asses out of there, still yelling “Lonely Lonely Sunday Morning” at the top of our lungs. A few days later, pneumonia nearly always kicked in. Worth it. 

2021. Everything is so still. So quiet. I can still hear the creak of the turnstiles, the soft crunch of the hay underfoot. I can smell the frying onions and burgers from the Hilton Lion’s Stand, and those doughnuts stationed around almost every corner willing you to be tempted by their tiny hot bods. A crack from a child throwing a pop-pop onto the ground, a sobbing child who’d just dropped an ice cream, and in the distance, the thunderous roll of the Looping Star. Beckoning. 

I get to the Olympia Hall. It’s so quiet. No one is looking at the building built in 1930. People are transfixed by their phones, tapping away. I feel like I’m part of the cow parade, but none of us are mooing; we’re just being herded into the various areas. It’s efficient; it’s cold, the lights flicker. I hear the laugh of a porcelain doll’s ghost in the distance. But I don’t care. I’m as excited as I was to climb those damn metal stairs up to the Looping Star. As the vaccine jabs into my arm, I feel the wind rush on my face as I approach the loop. 

‘Next!’ shouts the nurse. 

And like that, it’s all over.

A lot of the time we make decisions based on what works for us in a particular moment. Sometimes we pull it off, sometimes we fuck up, and sometimes we fuck up spectacularly. 

What we’re left with are consequences. How we move forward is a decision. And before we proceed, let’s take “resilience” off the table, and file it with “the new normal”. Burn before reading. 

If you’re looking for “all the feels” and an America’s Got Talent big moment, you’ve come to the wrong place. There might be a smattering of kumbaya, but I’m holding off on the magic circle where we sit around and drum together.  

I wasn’t supposed to be here this long. My decision to move back to Hilton was supposed to be a temporary pit stop, but I’ve committed to a spinning bike and NP number plates. I also post on Hilton Chat and am a card-carrying member of The Hilton Rate Payers Association, a security initiative, and a blasted WhatsApp group that up until recently served the purpose of informing me about where Hilton’s dogs are at. Things have escalated spectacularly from there. Why just a few months ago my mother and I walked into the Anew Hilton Hotel to attend a security meeting. How the world has changed. Back in the day we would walk in to start a shift (both of us), play a gig (my mum), pull a sickie from school (me). Mum and I were the types who looked in on community capers, we never joined in. I mean you’d battle to coax us to a book club (and there are books and wine there). 

Being back on our old stomping ground for the first time since my father sold it in 2009 was surreal. What was more surreal was that two of Hilton’s biggest “non-joiners” were attending a community meeting – plus I even voiced an opinion. Next thing you know we’ll be championing a bid to get the Hilton Lion’s Fair started up again. This on top of rumours that I’m planning to run for mayor might just tip the locals over the edge. Fear not, as much as I’d love to add years to the lives of Craig Miller and Pam Passmore, I’m afraid I’m just not that altruistic. But I am that local. It’s time to face the facts.  

I’m all about the facts. So much so that my job involves reading a lot of books. Let’s all fasten our seatbelts for a flagrant brag festival. Since November I’ve read 140 self-help, self-improvement, mindfulness, dazzling science, history, and some real roll your eyes out of your head level shit. I’m now the person people avoid at parties. Luckily we aren’t partying so my self-esteem is A-OK. Anyway the other day I was comforted while reading that the universe is chaos, and once we accept that and stop trying to impose order on it, we’ll be a lot happier. I find comfort in this because I’m not one who believes in “thoughts and prayers” and the power of a Facebook profile picture filter. Shit is whack. Is 42 even the meaning of life? And if it’s not, where do we begin? Thankfully I’m not here to give you meaning. I ain’t no Deepak Chopra. 

What I will tell you is this. Stories are everything. 

So here’s my voice from the chaos, and what I’ve observed. But before we begin I’ll let you in on a secret, all writers are basically lurkers who verge on stalking. A good story starts with what you know, and then you add in a sprinkling (a generous one) of exaggeration. 

Everyone will have their stories from the past week. Here’s mine. If you don’t like it, then write your own. I can’t pretend I’m not white, not privileged, and don’t live in Hilton. I will make one promise… there will be no virtue signaling, we’ve seen enough of that for one lifetime. “Hashtag doing my bit.”

It all began when Facebook and our local-security-slash-lost-dog WhatsApp group alerted me to the potential threat of JZ, which then escalated to about 25 trucks blazing on the N3. It didn’t bode well, but sadly South Africans are used to burning trucks. Some of us might smash an Urbanol or a homeopathic alternative, but for the most part, it’s business as usual. ‘Yoh, that’s a bit kak!’ 

Things went from kak to worse. Not since those two planes crashed into the twin towers have I felt the same levels of ‘What in the actual fuckshow is this new level of fuckshow?!’ We’ve seen looting, we’ve seen burning, but when I saw Brookside Mall get completely torched the tectonic plates shifted. These dudes meant business. You know what happened next, you’ve seen the videos, you’ve read the news. 

Shit escalated to full-on Oliver Stone, Game of Thrones, and let’s chuck in some Battle of Helm’s Deep cos it was shit cold and dark. 

I know people who were in the thick of it. In the thick of it, I was not. Was I scared shitless? Absolutely. The thing with fear is we fear the unknown, and what was happening was hella unknown. Howick and the greater Pmb were burning, and white okes in white bakkies were mobilising. I’m not gonna lie, I felt uncomfortable as hell. And then I felt grateful as hell. And then I felt conflicted because white bakkies are akin to K-Way puffer jackets and they make me antsy. Look, every community has a different story. We’ve all seen the videos of white vigilante mobs in certain areas going Full Metal Jacket and making shit awful decisions based on their casual, formal, or smart casual racism leanings. It’s not OK. But I’m not here to tell their stories.

So back to my story. Our local station commander “Captain He-Man” is a boss because he’s a man with a plan. And although women, and in some instances mice, make plans too, in this case, it’s Captain He-Man who needs a proverbial Bells or a Bar One, or an all open access to a car bar. Captain He-Man was lank firm with the okes in the white bakkies, and told them categorically that they needed to have their shit well and truly together. They weren’t to land their asses on Facebook viral for being a bunch of gung-ho clowns. They were to be the opposite of clown town. I’m assuming it went well because I saw a bagpiper on my newsfeed, and that’s a sign that the Matrix is still intact. Wait have I got that right?

Anyway moving on. When the WhatsApp came through that the Sweetwaters Community were joining the men in white bakkies, the SAPS, the various armed response chapters, and the bloody taxi drivers (“What?!”) it was beyond kiff. It was so kiff that we all let out a collective sigh of relief. The not so excellent part was the sigh brought with it a real humdinger of a cold front with an epic frost. This would have been OK except the prudent among us were heeding the warning to not use any bloody electricity because ‘If we blow a load, no one will hear our screams.’ Not even the loudest Negative Nancy or Hurrumphing Harold on Hilton Chat would be able to get the attention of Pam and Craig (the managers).

So on the danger front shit was secure. Other places were not so lucky. Big shout out to all the seriously kiff okes who stood sentinel and froze, while we moaned about how cold it was from under our blankies. We avoided the chaos because some people chose not to risk it, and others chose to protect the shit out of it. Sometimes the dice rolls in a different way.  

But then I received a message from a top human who we’ll call Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman. She’s not a doctor, but I’m not a “real” doctor either so who’s counting? The WhatsApp told me that the medicine situation was a few million points up from a grade-A shituation. Warehouses and pharmacies were the new Tops, and I can’t even fathom what a monumental bunch of supreme asshats would attack medicine. Not just knicking a few Grand-Pa for the Tops looting hangover, no, burning and looting wholesalers and all but completely destroying the supply chain. That was a decision that I’m not going to kumbaya in a hurry. 

So it was that for two days I helped Dr. Quinn and her team, and ferried medicine to the Police Station for the mostly-grateful Hilton residents in need of meds. One woman told me ‘This isn’t how anyone should be running a business,’ and I wondered if the taxidermy collection from the KwaZulu-Natal Museum was marching up Old Howick Road or if someone had magically rolled a five or an eight, or whatever one needs to get the hell out of Jumanji.

And now here we are… the white bakkies have dispersed, K-Way Puffer jackets have migrated back to the Quarry, and local hero Jono Hornby is once again in his natural habitat being awesome. If you want to contribute to his awesome, please check out the Sweetwaters Food Relief Project Facebook page. There are other people in other circles doing phenomenal things. Tell your stories. Hell, I’ll tell them for you if you can tolerate my propensity for throwing in a few f-bombs. 

So what did we learn? Well, I can’t speak for you, but I can speak for myself. I learned that we’re better when we get involved in other people’s stories. Be a verb and do cool shit. Be an adjective and make something extraordinary. Be a noun and add value. Hell, be a comma or full stop and offer someone a breath when they need it.  

And I didn’t promise to not use my favourite saying. And it’s never been so important. If you can, read the book. 

‘If this is your land, where are your stories?’ (J. Edward Chamberlain)       

Be a part of the story. It’s all we leave behind.

My WhatsApp is a literal buzz with friends telling me, ‘you think that’s bad I’ve put on 2 dress sizes’, and ‘my gut luggage is the only thing I’m currently traveling with’. As some of you may be aware, I’ve had to start running, well let’s call it what it is, “jogging”. It’s the end of the fucking world guys.   

Luckily for us women, we have decades of glossies, which have primed us for this very moment. The moment where we look into our cupboards and sigh. Our “fat jeans” are now the “one day I’ll fit into those again” hopefuls. We hurry past mirrors, we close our eyes when we’re in our underwear… ‘Look at the bloody state of me!’ We envy the body we hated and despised a year ago.

Cue Cosmo, stage left, to bring us that silver lining we all desperately need. 26 Ways to Dress For Your Body Type. 13 Pairs of Jeans to Hide Those Problem Areas. 18 Swimsuits to Make You Beach Ready. 42 Ways to Disguise How Fat and Gross You Are. The advice is endless, but one thing’s for certain, my body type has a methodology that’s been proven to make me feel like I want any other body type than what I’ve been given in the genetic lottery. ‘I wish I had her body, then I could wear a pencil skirt.’

Did you know that there’s a skirt shape to suit any body type? Plus there’s proof nogal? 

Fuck me I love science. According to the fine folk at popsugar.com you can wear mini skirts if you’re petite. If you’re tall and lean (read skinny) then you can pull off a maxi skirt. If you’re curvy (but not fat) you can wear a pencil skirt. “Athletic” women shouldn’t wear skirts above the knee; presumably to hide all of the effort you spend doing lunges and squats. Google ‘skirts to suit my body type’ and you’ll be dazzled and amazed at how much rigorous research has been put into this.

And I’m not even joking… there’s also a handy guide on shoes to suit your body type. It’s nice to know that if you’re athletic you can add more femininity to your look (crucial), by donning a pair of Mary Janes or ballerina flats. 

I find such comfort in knowing that as a woman my body has been scrutinised to such an extent that I now have an idiot-proof manual on exactly what to wear, and what not to wear. It’s also nice to know that when I decide to put my pear-shaped bod into a pencil skirt there will be some Cosmo-wielding fashion police(wo)man to give me a jolly good shaming. ‘Christ alive look at that Hiltermann woman, she clearly didn’t get the December issue… Look at the state of her fat arse in those flipflops!’

Doesn’t it seem such a shame that men are largely exempt from such close scrutiny? Isn’t it such a pity that men don’t get the benefit of such exhaustive fashion manuals? 

So, in my bid to close the gender gap… ahem… ‘Men do you want to dress for your body type?’

If your body type is “Businessman” then suits and ties are recommended. However, if you have more of a “Casual Businessman” body type then you can always remove the tie and opt for a lighter suit colour. And great news for those men who are “Athletic”. If you’re athletic you can wear active wear, or you can wear more general clothing to accentuate the fact that you have the perfect body. Every cut of gentlemen’s clothing fits the athletic bod perfectly, and you can marvel at how everything down to your basic flipflops looks fucking magnificent. And trust me, you won’t need to add a flourish of anything feminine to soften your hyper-masculine athletic beastly physique. And remember, everything above the knees where possible, you didn’t focus on leg day for nothing.

Not to worry “Geeks and Nerds”, skinny jeans fit any male body type, provided you have a background in IT or have some idea of basic coding. And not to be outdone, if you have a trust fund you’re going to look great in salmon, even if you have the complexion of a Christmas gammon. Jeans to suit your body type? Well if you’re a size 34 buy anything in size 34 and you’re good to go. As a side note, there is one faux pas and that’s to avoid the divorce-dad jeans, unless you’re a dad and divorced.

Men with a chunky wallet should accentuate this with conversation about Bitcoin. And don’t think I haven’t forgotten about swimwear. In this month’s issue, there’s a double-page spread on finding the best swimming costume for your body. For men wanting a bathing suit that dries quickly, synthetic fibres are your best bet. Board shorts are great because they have velcro and nylon laces to secure the garment. Speedos are usually made out of spandex. And finally, swimsuit briefs are designed to be aerodynamic. Armed with this wealth of knowledge I’ll bet you’ll find the perfect costume to maximise your beach confidence.

So, isn’t it about time you Lockdown your Body Type.

According to Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, there are five stages of grief- Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance. In South Africa there are currently eight stages of loadshedding, seven deadly sins (which Bheki Cele seems to be reading off), and now five stages of lockdown. South Africans are going to need a helluva App to deal with all of these stages (Pro Tip App Developers). Shit is about to get real. Again. Remember when we used to complain about water shedding and loadshedding? Fuck those were the good old days. What I wouldn’t give to go back to the threat of Day Zero. I remember thinking that was rock bottom. And I’ve said it before, my mum is right, “Things can ALWAYS get worse”.  

1. Denial:

You’ll notice I’ve been AWOL, MIA, “gone like a scone”. Over the past week or so, it dawned on me that I was hitting the ground running, and I hadn’t really stopped to “check-in” with myself. From the 14^th March until just after the Easter weekend, I self-isolated and launched myself into work and was a one-woman writing machine. I was doing the positivity thing and it was working, but when I stopped working, I realised that I was kayaking down the ol’ river of Denial and it was choc-full of crocodiles and other hazards. Social media repulsed me, nothing was funny, the light went out, and the reality of how long this is going to be really started to take shape. I couldn’t write… because I was at Stage One of Grief, Stage Zero of loadshedding, and Stage Five of lockdown. And I knew that lockdown was going to continue for the forseable future, it wasn’t a surprise, but somehow I didn’t actually stare at it in the face. Denial has many shapes. It’s not always well-rounded.

I decided to shift my focus and not put pressure on my self-created need to document every single day. Some days and weeks are best forgotten. Some are best kept private. Some are so intimate that you want to keep them for the humans who are most special to you. But the guilt of not writing weighed heavily, and as more days passed the more I realised that I was in a slippery slope, and I got fucking angry with myself. In academia we have a mantra that we live by, ‘I should be writing’.

• Anger:

There is a lot to be angry about. I miss some people so much that I don’t know how I will survive until Level Two (lockdown level). I am angry at Bheki Cele for being an asshole with a vendetta and a hat game that is so strong it’s scented with musk ox. I am angry when I go onto social media and I see how stupid and petty people can be. I’m angry with people who argue with experts. I am angry with people who think that “they’re entitled to have their own opinion” when they’re informed by lunatics (Fun Fact: they’re not). But for a while I was most angry with myself. As the days ticked by and the writing dried up, I was fucking angry that I couldn’t write, that I didn’t want to write, and that I was just incapable of looking at a blank page. I focused on putting emojis on dogs, putting together lecture content, and thinking. Thinking inevitably leads to manipulation, and manipulation is all about convincing yourself to do things. “Hello Spiral my old friend”, the widening gyre is upon us.

• Bargaining:

“Jaqui… you can either hoovie (hoover/vacuum) or stare at a blank page…” (Fun Fact: this was a stalemate). It’s amazing how bargaining works when there is only self-accountability. It’s amazing how many things fall off the table when you give yourself two really shit-kak options. The more shit activities you give yourself, the less you do. This is why people eat cake. And, writing is my favourite thing in the world, until it’s not. And when it’s not fun, it’s abusive. The bargaining was making me feel shit because I was stuck, and I started to hate the thing that brings me the most pleasure. Writing is supposed to make me happy.

• Depression:

An identity crisis is something that I’m well versed in. I have many personalities and they’re not always easy to reconcile. Writing allows me to straddle the borders of my personalities, for good or for bad. Ivan Vladislavic says it perfectly in his masterpiece, The Distance,

‘Then again, my brother’s need to be someone else never goes away. He becomes a writer. You can see the catastrophe coming down the pike.’

(Vladislavic: 2019, 73)

The pen is a sword, sometimes you have to fall on your sword for your artlessness. And sometimes you need to be fucking sad.  

• Acceptance:

Once I’d accepted that it was OK to feel like crap, and that no one else has any expectations of me (I’m hardly G.R.R. Fucking Martin- please finish your bloody book already!), I started to realise that I’m an idiot. This happens a lot. I don’t like to admit that I can be an idiot because it’s not good for my street cred. Anyway, I decided to do what my Emotional Support Animal (E.S.A) Bestie says, which is “focus on 1%”. My E.S.A picks up great advice, which is useful because I usually need it. Anyway, she reckons that the best way to live is to do everything 1% better than the previous day- so if you write 500 words on one day, write just a few more than that the next day. It applies to everything, and it’s been a game changer for me because I’m competitive and sometimes I want to push it to 10 or even 20%. Other days 1% is just fine.

So, I changed my focus, I handwrote letters, I photographed them, and I sent them to people I love. I’ll do more of this. I wrote lists, and I checked off things, which is satisfying as fuck. I accepted that lockdown has become a new set of stages, and that we’re not going anywhere. Our worlds are tiny, and sometimes there will be nothing to say, and that’s OK. Sometimes you won’t want to talk. Sometimes you’ll just want to listen. And sometimes you’ll want to scream into the fucking void. All the world’s a stage as we march towards the last scene of all… the scene that ends this strange eventful history*.